WhatsApp took all my contacts and sent to their servers without asking me

[crackb3ri]

Installed it tonight and ran. It just asked me if I want to connect to whatsap servers which I allowed and then to my surprise saw all my contacts installed who have the app and their statuses.

After some digging found that WhatsApp sends all your contact phone numbers to their servers and they check if those phone numbers have WhatsApp installed so you can IM with them.

To me this is serious privacy concern as now WhatsApp has hundreds of verified phone numbers of my contacts and I didnt even agree to it.

How can they do that without any warning / disclaimer? How is AppWorld allowing application like this?

Scary.

[trucky]

I'm just guessing here, because I haven't installed that particular app yet, that somewhere in all the legal mumbo jumbo that you agreed to as you installed, there are words saying that you are allowing them to do just that by clicking on Agree.

[crackb3ri]

That is possible but my main concern is how app can access contacts without me giving it adequate permission first? I did not give it a trusted app status when got prompted.

[MADBRADNYC]

Originally Posted by crackb3ri

Installed it tonight and ran. It just asked me if I want to connect to whatsap servers which I allowed and then to my surprise saw all my contacts installed who have the app and their statuses.

After some digging found that WhatsApp sends all your contact phone numbers to their servers and they check if those phone numbers have WhatsApp installed so you can IM with them.

To me this is serious privacy concern as now WhatsApp has hundreds of verified phone numbers of my contacts and I didnt even agree to it.

How can they do that without any warning / disclaimer? How is AppWorld allowing application like this?

Scary.

Well. You said it yourself in the first post.

It just asked me if I want to connect to whatsap servers which I allowed

Not sure why it took digging to find out that...

WhatsApp sends all your contact phone numbers to their servers and they check if those phone numbers have WhatsApp installed so you can IM with them.

It clearly states that on the page description.

* NO PINS OR USERNAMES. Why even bother having to remember yet another PIN or username? WhatsApp works just like SMS would work via phone numbers and it integrates with your the address book of your device.

* NO NEED TO ADD BUDDIES. Your Address Book is used to automatically connect you with your contacts. Your friends with WhatsApp will be automatically displayed in Favorites menu.

Sometimes you need to pay attention to what you're doing and actually read things.

Posted from my CrackBerry at wapforums.crackberry.com

[crackb3ri]

Originally Posted by MADBRADNYC

Well. You said it yourself in the first post.
Not sure why it took digging to find out that...
It clearly states that on the page description.
Sometimes you need to pay attention to what you're doing and actually read things.

You are joking me right? You really interpret "Your Address Book is used" meaning "we will send all your contacts to our servers"? To me this is very misleading wording. It could be just me though.... ;-)

I honestly believe sending phone book data to someone's server should warrant bit more warning and "upfrontiness" IMHO.

[MADBRADNYC]

Originally Posted by crackb3ri

You are joking me right? You really interpret "Your Address Book is used" meaning "we will send all your contacts to our servers"? To me this is very misleading wording. It could be just me though.... ;-)

I honestly believe sending phone book data to someone's server should warrant bit more warning and "upfrontiness" IMHO.

Sigh....
LoL. Well, you tell us how the application can connect you with other WhatsApp users? The app itself cannot check if "John" in your address book, against who also uses the application. Obviously it would have to cross reference those names in your address book somewhere, correct? The app does not operate in a vacuum. It needs to connect with their servers to do this.

You are NOT the first to ask about this...
Maybe even a search of the forums could have informed you prior to download.

Posted from my CrackBerry at wapforums.crackberry.com

[whatsapp]

a few notes to clear up here:

1. first of all, your address book is not saved or stored anywhere on our end. we don't need it. we don't want it. we are not an advertising supported product and our goal is to know as little information about our users as we possibly can. i know it might sound weird in the world where everything is "free" and supported by ads, but we are quite different in this regard.

2. secondly, it would be pretty silly for us to want to save address books of the mobile users. the engineering complexity alone would not be something a small startup like us would want to undertake on.

3 thirdly one small piece of advice: we are the good guys, but there are a lot of bad guys out there who don't play fair or have an "undefined" business models. if you are really worried about your data privacy and security, not only should you never download any shady 3rd party applications, you should not even be using a smartphone at all.

so in conclusion, one more time: while we do a transient check of the phone number in the address book to find other WhatsApp users and properly route messages between you and your friends, none of your address book numbers are ever saved or stored on our servers.

now, can anybody help me figure out how how improve battery life on my 9900?


-- jan
(whatsapp inc. ceo and co-founder)

[MADBRADNYC]

Originally Posted by whatsapp

now, can anybody help me figure out how how improve battery life on my 9900?

Ummm. Yeah. Delete every other application, and use only WhatsApp?

With that...
Did I win the prize for the $64K question?

[tohawang]

Originally Posted by whatsapp

a few notes to clear up here:

1. first of all, your address book is not saved or stored anywhere on our end. we don't need it. we don't want it. we are not an advertising supported product and our goal is to know as little information about our users as we possibly can. i know it might sound weird in the world where everything is "free" and supported by ads, but we are quite different in this regard.

2. secondly, it would be pretty silly for us to want to save address books of the mobile users. the engineering complexity alone would not be something a small startup like us would want to undertake on.

3 thirdly one small piece of advice: we are the good guys, but there are a lot of bad guys out there who don't play fair or have an "undefined" business models. if you are really worried about your data privacy and security, not only should you never download any shady 3rd party applications, you should not even be using a smartphone at all.

so in conclusion, one more time: while we do a transient check of the phone number in the address book to find other WhatsApp users and properly route messages between you and your friends, none of your address book numbers are ever saved or stored on our servers.

now, can anybody help me figure out how how improve battery life on my 9900?


-- jan
(whatsapp inc. ceo and co-founder)

Hi, Whatsapp agent, pls fix your version 2.7.2739. Because it gives problems to my 9780. Also as quoted before that all my contacts are gone several times, fortunately ive got backup.
Thanks:

[Alex_Hong]

Originally Posted by tohawang

Hi, Whatsapp agent, pls fix your version 2.7.2739. Because it gives problems to my 9780. Also as quoted before that all my contacts are gone several times, fortunately ive got backup.
Thanks:

whatsapp basically just pull your contacts on your phone and include it inside whatsapp. i dont think it stores any contact information. if your phone's address book is empty, whatsapp will be empty too.

correct me if i'm wrong.

[Mark Donovan]

Ive just had a user report this to me last week, all contacts appear to be missing
but strangely if your searching for a user it still picks them up, you just cant see them listed under contacts on the blackberry device no more. The user does not have any backups of them is there anyway to make them show again?

[husainpatan]

Originally Posted by whatsapp

a few notes to clear up here:

1. first of all, your address book is not saved or stored anywhere on our end. we don't need it. we don't want it. we are not an advertising supported product and our goal is to know as little information about our users as we possibly can. i know it might sound weird in the world where everything is "free" and supported by ads, but we are quite different in this regard.

2. secondly, it would be pretty silly for us to want to save address books of the mobile users. the engineering complexity alone would not be something a small startup like us would want to undertake on.

3 thirdly one small piece of advice: we are the good guys, but there are a lot of bad guys out there who don't play fair or have an "undefined" business models. if you are really worried about your data privacy and security, not only should you never download any shady 3rd party applications, you should not even be using a smartphone at all.

so in conclusion, one more time: while we do a transient check of the phone number in the address book to find other WhatsApp users and properly route messages between you and your friends, none of your address book numbers are ever saved or stored on our servers.

now, can anybody help me figure out how how improve battery life on my 9900?


-- jan
(whatsapp inc. ceo and co-founder)

Hey thanx for this wonderful piece of software. It saves me a fortune.

@OP: So what?
People nowadays have started assuming as if communication via technology is their birth right. Its a privilege.